That was from the FOCA 1985 video review of Silverstone when Prost came up to lap Andrea.

"I was not quite sure with de Cesaris, sometimes can be a very dangerous driver'

Totally unfounded remark..

I think Senna did the commentary for the Austrian GP on the 85 review. de Cesaris went off and barrel rolled his Ligier to destruction in practice and Guy Ligier flipped and sacked poor Andrea on the spot!

Anyway, on the commentary Senna says something like "and now we see de Cesaris having a small accident!!!" - priceless. It was actually one of the biggest smashes I've ever seen!

This is something I forgot to say about de Cesaris.
He has a typical Latin temperament.He was excitable and emotional (see below),has been known
to cry with anger or joy at what happens to him during a race weekend.He sometimes seemed to
ignore reason,prefering to stick to his own ideas even though expirience has proven him wrong.
About this,here is an article about USA-west GP 1982.
"In a weekend of surprises,the only man to pip Lauda to pole-and only just on the last timed lap
long after the pit personel had turned away from the computer-timing,video display,sure that Niki
had it made-was young Andrea de Cesaris.The 22 year old Alfa Romeo driver whose place at
McLaren had been taken by Lauda had beaten the maestro at his own much-practiced art.For
de Cesaris there were tears of Latin joy after his superb qualifying performance,in which he stole
the first pole of his career by a tenth of a second.After the race it was all that he could do to hold
back tears of a very different kind.He had led into the first corner without chalenge and he had
stayed in front for 15 laps.Over twenty-two minutes glorious minutes in which to drag a reputation
from the depths of impudent wrecklessness to the sudenly exalted height of a brilliant new star;
time to revel in the rare sparkle of the V-12 powered Alfa182,making its finest showing of the year
on a circuit that obliged the Michelins and emphasised the Alfa magnanimous turn-in capabilities."

I think Andrea got an early reputation as a crasher, and it kinda dogged him for the rest of his career. In the early 80s he got some good rives thanks to Marlboro, but never really fulfilled his potential, and that combined with numerous large accidents killed his changes of a top flight drive.

Long Beach 83? was a case in point - de Cesaris was leading, and looking good for a win if not a high finish, when he came across a backmarker who baulked him, Andrea took the opportunity to vent his feelings as he finally got past the lapped car, by shaking his fist. Alas, he should really have been using the same fist to change gear at that precise moment, and in a flash Lauda was past and into the lead...

His reputation as a car smaher reached its height in 1985 for Ligier - numerous spectacular accidents (Monaco & Austria in particular) led to Guy Ligier sacking him there and then.

For the rest of the 80s Andrea then drove for lowly teams - Minardi 86 etc, although I recall he finished 3rd at Mexico 1987 for Brabham-BMW (BMW's last podium before 2000 I think - unles you count the Arrows Megatron of 1988 which gave Cheever 3rd at Monza).

He remained accident prone even after years in F1 - Phoenix 89 he contrived to hit his team mate at Dallara, Alex Caffi while being lapped. Alex was running 2nd at the time...

Andrea's career appeared to be going no where, but 91 at Jordan saw a new de Cesaris. He was fast, had few accidents (and when he did crash it, car failure was to blame - as a t Silverstone). He bought the 191 home in the points frequently - I think he scored 8 points all year, and was a leading figure at Spa, wher he may well have won had Cosworth told Jordan their latest engine needed more oil - alas unlucky Andrea's engine blew up a fe wlasp from home while runnign 2nd.

I never understood why Andrea and EJ didn't stay together for 1992 (although Andrea in hindsight was probably glad he dind't!). After that I think he drove for Tyrrell without much success, and was out of a drive for 94. Called up by Jordan again as cover for Barrichello, he took a storming 4th at Monaco, and signed with Sauber to replace the injured Wendlinger, which gave Andrea 200 GP starts.

Mikedeering,few corections:It was Long Beach 1982 not 1983;he scored 9 points for Jordan 1991.
He didn't stay with Jordan in 1992 because his main sponsor was Marlboro and Eddie made a deal
with another tobaco sponsor-Barclay.

Originally posted by andrea Mikedeering,few corections:It was Long Beach 1982 not 1983;he scored 9 points for Jordan 1991.He didn't stay with Jordan in 1992 because his main sponsor was Marlboro and Eddie made a dealwith another tobaco sponsor-Barclay.

Forza Andrea,

Thanks for the corrections - one think though re tobacco sponsorship - Andrea drove for Ligier in 1985, when they were sponsored by Gitanes cigarettes. What happened to his Marlboro support then? I know Marlboro played a significant role in his career - McLaren, Alfa Romeo, Dallara etc.

There is a clip of a car coming out of a right-hander onto the pit straight. The driver looses it on the left curb and goes hard across the track into the pit wall. The car is completely destroyed when it finally comes to a stop.

The driver is commenting in the background and says something to the effect of "I think something in the car broke, not in the front but in the back. But its hard to say since the car is so....destroyed."

Originally posted by mikedeering I think Andrea got an early reputation as a crasher, and it kinda dogged him for the rest of his career. In the early 80s he got some good rives thanks to Marlboro, but never really fulfilled his potential, and that combined with numerous large accidents killed his changes of a top flight drive.

Long Beach 83? was a case in point - de Cesaris was leading, and looking good for a win if not a high finish, when he came across a backmarker who baulked him, Andrea took the opportunity to vent his feelings as he finally got past the lapped car, by shaking his fist. Alas, he should really have been using the same fist to change gear at that precise moment, and in a flash Lauda was past and into the lead...

His reputation as a car smaher reached its height in 1985 for Ligier - numerous spectacular accidents (Monaco & Austria in particular) led to Guy Ligier sacking him there and then.

For the rest of the 80s Andrea then drove for lowly teams - Minardi 86 etc, although I recall he finished 3rd at Mexico 1987 for Brabham-BMW (BMW's last podium before 2000 I think - unles you count the Arrows Megatron of 1988 which gave Cheever 3rd at Monza).

He remained accident prone even after years in F1 - Phoenix 89 he contrived to hit his team mate at Dallara, Alex Caffi while being lapped. Alex was running 2nd at the time...

Andrea's career appeared to be going no where, but 91 at Jordan saw a new de Cesaris. He was fast, had few accidents (and when he did crash it, car failure was to blame - as a t Silverstone). He bought the 191 home in the points frequently - I think he scored 8 points all year, and was a leading figure at Spa, wher he may well have won had Cosworth told Jordan their latest engine needed more oil - alas unlucky Andrea's engine blew up a few laps from home while runnign 2nd.

I never understood why Andrea and EJ didn't stay together for 1992 (although Andrea in hindsight was probably glad he dind't!). After that I think he drove for Tyrrell without much success, and was out of a drive for 94. Called up by Jordan again as cover for Barrichello, he took a storming 4th at Monaco, and signed with Sauber to replace the injured Wendlinger, which gave Andrea 200 GP starts.

Pretty much spot on there Mike!

Just to fill you in some more on a couple of points, Mexico 1987 it was Patrese who eventually finished 3rd for Brabham - but ironically de Cesaris drove his strongest race so far contesting 2nd place with Senna until Ayrton pushed Andrea off the track when he tried to get past him after missing a gear.....

The Brabhams of 1987 were never very far off the pace and with a little more discipline and luck de Cesaris could have rebuilt his reputation that year. As it was he had to wait until 1991 to do so.

Oh yeah, Patrese was third at Mexico. de Cesaris did get a podium that year though - at Spa. It would appear he was a bit of a Spa specialist - I believe he was on pole there in 1983, and as mentioned before, drove a stormer there in 1991.

As well as being resonably competitive in 1987, the Brabhams also looked gorgeous. Especially compared to the "skateboard" from 1986...

Originally posted by unrepentant lurker OK, I have a question. Is this de Cesaris?

There is a clip of a car coming out of a right-hander onto the pit straight. The driver looses it on the left curb and goes hard across the track into the pit wall. The car is completely destroyed when it finally comes to a stop.

The driver is commenting in the background and says something to the effect of "I think something in the car broke, not in the front but in the back. But its hard to say since the car is so....destroyed."

No...

I think that is Eric Comas speaking after crashing his Larrousse at Mexico in '90 or '91 - Can't recall which - It's on the season review at any rate.

It IS Phillipe Alliot. I have the video of the crash, and it mentions his name right there.

I have to say that he was pretty lucky to escape unscathed from that wreck.

The reason why in Mexico there were so many crashes in Mexico was due to the tracks bumpy surface, especially in the dangerous last corner La Peraltada. That corner claimed Ayrton Senna when he flipped in 91.

Probably that's the reason why the Mexican GP didn't push in 1993. The track has been over the years in crappy conditions, that is, up until now that CART is going to race there, I believe in next year or in 2003.

As far as I know, they had, like in these last three or four years, but I also heard that when CART comes, it's going to be reinstated to it's original form

the main reason the track was altered like that is because of that stupid football stadium they built in the infield. That screwed up some of the sections since they had to cut them out for parking space.

You're right with the first picture of Andrea's twitch: this was taken during the tragic Canadian GP '82, where Andrea's compatriot Paletti died. I have scanned it from a German book about the faces of Formula One called '180 Rennfahrer' by Joseph Emonts-pohl, published in 1989 (at a time, when F1 was not very popular in Germany, some would say even antisocial!). It was a really, really expensive book at the time, but I'm glad I've bought it, for it suddenly dissapeared completely from the scene and I never saw it again. Well, it has it's mistakes and the pictures are not the best - but there are about 1.100 (!) pictures (all in colour) covering the period between 1974-1989. Most of the pictures are taken at the Belgian, Dutch and German GP.

Speaking about Germany & Formula One: I think Andrea's best year (in my eyes) was the year he spent with Guenther Schmidt's RIAL-Team, where he had some fine drives in this one-man-team, geared completely to Andrea deCesaris. Both had their troubles, but after Andrea left the team (or was fired by Schmidt - can someone tell more?) at the end of the '88 season, the team fell apart and one year - and a lot of scandals - later it dissapeared from the scene completely, while Andrea still had a lot of years in Formula One.

Andrea usually qualified midfield - and, what was more, did some fantastic races. He made a strong bedut in Brazil, where he was in 6th place for some laps. In Canada he was 5th with only only three laps to go, when he ran out of fuel, in Detroit he finished a fantastic 4th and in his last race, in Australia, he was again in 5th place, when 5 laps from the end again he ran out of fuel. I heard that Schmidt said after this recent incident: 'Thank god, the season is over, I could'nt stand it anymore with this driver!' I wonder who has maken the mistake in both races, when Andrea ran out of fuel...?

But this Rial ARC1-Cosworth, built by former Ferrari-designer Gustav Brunner and called the ‘Blue Ferrari', was one of the best looking GP cars during the 80ties. It was one of the smallest and simplest GP cars ever seen.

McRonalds,about Andrea's time at Rial.He was not fired by Schmidt,but left the team for his own
reason.Since Bruner left Rial(August 1-st),situation in this team was not very good,,because everyone thought how to make more money and nobody cared about developments of the car.
So Andrea left Rial and joined Scuderia Italia where atmosphere was much beter.

Hallo Andrea, my server is still down - so I can't download the old pictures of Andrea deCesaris, but here is one I found from Germany '83 - and so I placed it on another server - I hope it will last there a little longer

I can confirm this. Andrea was rumoured to drive for Scuderia Italia in 1989 as far as I remember form the autumn of 1988. Remember, after a solid performance, the Dallara chassis with Cosworth power started produce some promising results in the second half of the 1988 season. Alex Caffi had started the Hungarian GP from tenth position, which was a remarkable achievement from a new team. (One year he would be second fastest after Friday and eventually would start the race from third!) I think de Cesaris made the right move to jump the ship. Dallara was a good choice for 1989.

My ranking of Andrea's top 5 races:
1.USA-west GP 1982
This is the best race for me because after disaster in 1981 with 24 crashes and nickname
"De Crasheris",he stole pole position from Lauda (who replaced him in McLaren) which wasn't
easy and drove excelent race until retirement.
2.South Africa GP 1983
3.Belgian GP 1983
4.Belgian GP 1991
5.Belgian GP 1982
Remember that is my opinion.Any other coments?

Slightly off topic but Andrea's performances for Alfa in 1983, as well as promises from Euroracing, convinced Riccardo Patrese to sign for the team in 1984/5. Things didn't exactly turn out very well though

Originally posted by andrea My ranking of Andrea's top 5 races:1.USA-west GP 1982This is the best race for me because after disaster in 1981 with 24 crashes and nickname"De Crasheris",he stole pole position from Lauda (who replaced him in McLaren) which wasn'teasy and drove excelent race until retirement.2.South Africa GP 19833.Belgian GP 19834.Belgian GP 19915.Belgian GP 1982Remember that is my opinion.Any other coments?

Forza Andrea,

I'd like to nominate Mexico 1987, Mexico 1991 and France 1991 to that list.

In Mexico 87 he was challenging Senna for Second place until he was pushed off when Ayrton missed a gear, and Patrese went on to finish 3rd. Definate question of what might have been there.

Mexico 1991 he was mixing it with the best for most of the race, Senna, Mansell, Berger, Patrese et all and finished a worthy 4th.

France 1991 saw a magnificent recovery drive from last on lap 1 to 6th at the end, and earned Murray Walker's drive of the day in his Grand Prix Year 1991.

De Angelis86,I agree with you.I also like to nominate San Marino 1984 and Britain 1985.

In San Marino 1984 Andrea started from the pit and during the race he climbed on 3-rd place,but because of problems with gearbox he had to retire.

In Silverstone 1985 he drove the best race for Ligier and in the early part of the race he passed Prost with McLaren and Mansell with Williams and was 3-rd.He eventually will finished 3-rd,but because of clutch he didn't fionish the race.